Speechless
by ezyl
Summary: And then Shinji shut up.


**I needed a break from all the other chapter-fics I have (especially Inui's Fangirl, which I am thinking of discontinuing)...so I got this.**

**A ShinjixAnn oneshot. The first one. I love playing with Shinji. He's one of my favorite characters (after Eiji, Kirihara, Shiraishi...and all that).**

**Disclaimer: Don't own any PoT charries...**

**Also, be on guard for possible OOCness and unwarned POV change...it sort of starts out with Kamio and ends with Shinji, but stays in 3rd POV, if ya know what I'm talking about...**

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Kamio Akira dreaded eating lunch in the cafeteria on Mondays and Wednesdays.

"Ne, Akira, do you think I should cut my hair? I mean, it's always been sort of on the _long_ side, if you know what I mean, and Tachibana-buchou said something about long hair distracting you from your game…maybe that's why he cut it and everything, though I really liked his blond hair. I guess maybe that's why I couldn't win against Echizen from Seigaku –"

"Eat your bento, Shinji."

Shinji ignored his friend's insensitive comment, and stuck a finger halfway up his foreheads on the first few strands of his blue hair, examining it in the dull lunchroom ceiling lights.

"But then it would be so much trouble to cut all of it off – I kinda like it anyways…and partly the reason I couldn't win that game against Echizen was because of the weather. It was totally humid that day, and I probably didn't use my kick serve to its full ability. That spot thing didn't work too well either, I mean, any other opponent would probably have gotten more than their eye poked out – _not_ that I'm saying it was fortunate for Echizen to have his eye poked out, I feel very sorry for him – but more of the fact that maybe my hair wasn't the big problem in my tennis…"

"_Shinji_, shut up."

"Maybe I _should_ cut it. I heard that the new style was 'short and simple', or something like that. Maybe I should go look at my mother's fashion magazines again."

Kamio choked on his soda, "You," – cough – "Read," – cough – "Your," – cough, cough – "Mother's _fashion magazines?!_"

"Only on the toilet. She leaves them there all the time, and it's not like I have anything _else _to do when I'm –"

"Shinji, I'm eating!" Kamio gave a big roar and stood up, knocking the rest of his lunch tray over and into Shinji's newly-laundered tennis jacket. Sticky rice, chopped seaweed and Korean lettuce made a great _squelch_ as the contents of his bowl came into contact with the front of Shinji's jacket zipper. The Fudomine colors turned from white, magenta, and black to a sickly brown, even sicker orangey-brown, and earth-toned vomit.

The blue-haired boy gave a melodramatic gasp, abruptly stopped his one-sided conversation (for once in his life), and ran to the bathroom in horror. Normally, he wouldn't have minded a little messy food, but Kamio had never publicly tried to humiliate him to this degree before, _never_.

At least, he didn't think so.

But then again, he thought _way_ too much.

That was stating the obvious, there.

Like that time in grade two, the first time he ever went to Kamio's house to play, and tried to make a good catchphrase for a really stupid commercial on television…Kamio had ignored him the whole time he was talking, choosing to listen to the mp3 player that he had gotten for _Shinji's_ birthday – in the end, initiating a tennis match to shut him up.

Or, his 9th birthday party at the swimming pool, when he tried to explain the mechanics behind an underwater handstand and its differences and similarities with an underwater somersault…Kamio started a water fight by stuffing one of those foam noodles in his mouth.

Or the time when he tried to ask Kamio why he had a crush on Tachibana Ann anyways. She was the buchou's _younger sister_, after all, and hardly good-looking. Not like the models in his mother's fashion magazines. But then again, the little girl did have really great hair…all orange-red and neatly cut – he really wanted hair like hers.

And thinking of Tachibana Ann, Shinji got an idea.

_If Kamio can humiliate me, then, surely, I can do something that will bother him._

After school, Shinji sent the jacket back to the dry cleaner's, and marched up to buchou's house.

_Should I call her 'Tachibana-san'? No, too formal. How about 'Ann-chan'? But Kamio calls her that and she might get suspicious. And if I called her 'Ann-san', wouldn't that just be a…_

…_oh, screw it. Just act normal._

He stopped at the lot on the sidewalk. Walked up the neatly paved path to the grand Tachibana household, stepped onto the porch, knocked on the heavy, oak front door.

The door cracked open a few inches. A head stuck out.

"Who – oh, it's you, Ibu-sempai. Are you looking for Kamio-kun? He's not here. I heard he was doing extra practice by himself."

He looked up at her. Their eyes met.

Ibu Shinji was speechless.

In itself, a contradictory phrase. The only time _Shinji_ and _speechless_ could have been in the same sentence, was if the words _is not_ had been inserted between the two.

But he really, really couldn't talk.

Not when he was staring into Ann's cute – no,_ beautiful_ – face.

Maybe he had never stared directly into her face before, never noticed her startling, innocent eyes, her simple, elegantly arched brows, her rosy cheeks, her plump, gorgeous lips…her hair was definitely glossier than before, and she had done something to luminate her face; it had taken on a healthy, pink glow. Was she blushing?

No, he had obviously never seen her features up close, before. Whenever Ann had come to any of their tennis practice sessions, he had always been focused on the game, or talking to himself.

If she _had _been noticed, he probably wouldn't be able to grip a racket properly.

"What's wrong, Ibu-sempai? You look…flushed."

He wanted to kiss her. Right then, and there.

_Wait, _what?

Such a bizarre thought seemed to reawaken his speech. Reawaken enough of it to compose single-phrased sentences, at least.

"Listen, Ann-chan," – oh, _damn_, he had called her Ann-chan – "would you – would you…"

"Yes?"

"_Wouldyougooutwithme?_" His palms were sweaty. His green t-shirt crumpled, hair messy and uncombed, his appearance resembling a hermit.

The worse part, his mouth was open, in a perfectly circular little "o". And not a word was coming out of it.

"I'm sorry, _what_?"

Furious, Shinji shook himself and tried again.

"Ann, would you _gooutwithme_?"

This was – clearly – not working.

Ann had a pained look on her face as she adjusted her orange sunflower dress. The strap was sliding down her shoulder. He noticed what she was wearing. Strappy, slightly-heeled pink sandals. Cute, bright red barrettes. She had colored her nails a light pink, matching the sandals. The sundress fit her perfectly, hugged every curve, displayed her smooth, long legs.

It made him all the more speechless. All the more _not_ Shinji.

He gagged on his own breath, stuttered over his words, attempted to control his eyes from wandering too far…

"Ibu-sempai, I'm really sorry. I have to go. Momoshiro Takeshi from Seigaku asked me out on a date…I don't want to be late."

The words _Momoshiro_ and _date_ seemed to pop out of her lips. Like keys, they unlocked his voice as he realized that he was already too late to embarrass Kamio. He muttered something quickly about having to go somewhere, and walked away.

Today was some day to remember.

It was the day Ibu Shinji realized he was in love with Tachibana Ann.

And next time, he would do something about that.

If only he would stop acquiring chronic muteness every time he neared her.

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**A/N: I think they're cute together...wonder why people don't pair them more often.**

**Thanks for reading! Hope it wasn't TOO long and boring...leave a review!**

**Like I said earlier on, I'm think of discontinuing Inui's Fangirl. There's too much character change and scattered ideas. It's like my vent-fic, where I just add random ideas when I feel like it. You can vote for continuation or discontinuation in my poll (on profile).**


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